Repository: UIHistories Project: Book - History of the University (Powell) [PAGE 412]

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Industrial Universities for the People

871

greasing, but never finished. A true process of education, there • fore, can never stop; it can never be either remitted or finished; and all systems of scholastic learning constructed on that idea, are monkish, preposterous, delusive and false; and just so far forth, a curse instead of a blessing to mankind, ever begetting a spirit of pedantic littleness, frivolity and the supercilious pride of a conceited monk or an India Brahman, instead of that brave, generous and steadfast heroism that should characterize the true man. It is self-evident that in order to reach this end, and to avoid these antagonistic evils, our systems of public instruction should all have due reference to the varied employments of men in after life; so that each class may be placed in a position which shall enable them to develop a LITERATURE OF THEIR OWN, and acquire a mental as well as moral discipline, in connection with their own occupations, interests and pursuits. In other words, the effort should be to make each man an intelligent, thinking man, in his own profession in life, rather than out of it; to teach him, first, to understand his own business rather than other people's. Then he will be better able to govern and take care of himself, and need less expenditure from the State and the church in controlling and taking care of him. This principle has, in theory, become fully recognized, and applied with more or less perfection to some four or five of the varied pursuits of men, and obviously, ought to be applied in the same way and on the same principle to them all. The divines, the lawyers, the physicians, the teachers, and the military men of our country, each and all, have their specific schools, libraries, apparatus and universities, for the application of all known forms of knowledge to their several professions in life. Hence the surprising intelligence and power which these classes now exhibit, since the founding of universities and schools for their special uses, compared with that manifested by the same classes in the times of the monks, barons, quacks, schoolmen and crusaders of the middle ages. Hence the eloquence and power of our pulpits, and our courts and senates—the efficiency of our medical and military skill. I t is true that the laws of God are everywhere, and to all persons and classes, the same; and that all science is based upon these